November 3 - 26 -- Working and Playing

Let's discuss the work first. Six days but only 17 hours, so less than three hours per day, but very productive targeted projects accomplished or started.

The aft head "spit up" when the bowl was near empty and being flushed dry. A very unpleasant experience with sewage, though now with antifreeze. We essentially had not used this head all summer, using the forward one only. But I called John of Groco, the maker of the head (Groco also made the salt water strainer for the engine). John is a font of knowledge and worth his weight in gold as far as I'm concerned, and the best reason to use Groco products. When I said "spitting up," he said "Oh yes; just replace parts 6-11 of the expanded diagram". I had the diagram but could have viewed on line if I had needed to. He said he could sell this little assembly to me but I had one in the head repair kit (though I should buy another set to replace the parts that are now in use). I made several calls to John before the job was done. There is a rubber piece backed up by hard plastic piece at the bottom of the bowl which is depressed downward by the suction of the flushing action and then springs back up into place again because of a spring that pushes it back up. That spring was not pushing up anymore so water that was flushed down came back spitting up. To replace the pieces the big ceramic toilet bowl which is held in place atop the pumping mechanism by four bolts, and the rubber gasket preventing leaks between the ceramic bowl and the metal pump had to be removed. Then the flapper is screwed to the bottom of a flat brass "washer-like" piece of 3/8 inch cast brass, almost three inches in diameter that sits atop the pump. I could not pull it up and out with my rubber glove cased fingers as John suggested. What to do? I got out a bolt from the parts box that was longer than the inside diameter of the "washer" but shorter that the inside diameter of the cylinder it sat atop. I tied a line around the middle of the bolt, securely, because I did not want the bolt to fall off into the cylinder, and tied the other end of the line around a piece of metal pipe. Then I crouched with my hands on the pipe near my knees and used the strong muscles of my thighs to yank it up. It worked!  Next "problem" was a nut in the repair kit that held the pieces 6-11 together in their correct order. (A) I could not see where it went on the exploded diagram. (B) The bolt was not long enough for it. (C) It was not on the old parts I had pulled out. What am I missing here?, I asked John. Not to worry, he replied, it is just in the spares kit to hold the pieces together in the correct position relative to each other and can be discarded. Come spring, when the boat is back in the water and the seacocks opened, we will see if I have been successful. Now you know more about the Groco head than you ever wanted to know.

I called our rigger, Jeff Lazar, to check out the starboard coach roof winch which is used primarily to trim the small jib. I had taken it apart and serviced it last winter and the self tailing feature was not working consistently. I thought I had put it back together again incorrectly, and after three seconds, Jeff saw that this was so, but not involving the interior mechanism as I had feared. No, the self tailing feature is created by two rubber jaws at the top and they have ridges on their surfaces that face each other and grab and hold the line. One had been inserted upside down -- no ridges on the inside. Jeff also suggested using a soft shackle to hold the turning block for the genoa furling line to a more solid part of the aft cockpit rail. I asked him to return in the spring, when the cover is off to conduct a full inspection of the rigging, the first such professional job since the fall of 2010.

I reinstalled one of the two new Perko latches which hold down sections of the cabin sole.

I removed the second handle from the door between the forward head and the sleeping compartment. The mechanism was corroded and "stuck" which prevented the door from closing. Once removed, the door fits well into the frame and now it is up to me to clean, shine, lubricate and reinstall the brass hardware and this door should work again.

I took off and measured the "D" shackle that attaches the main sheet block to the traveler and with accurate dimensions was able to order a new Wichard "High Resistance" one, about 50 percent greater breaking strength so that hopefully it will not break again as it did in Hyannis last summer. Including shipping this was $50.00 for a very small, but essential part!  And I'm chasing down the Permateak installer to get a more attractive surface for the swim platform.

The three new pencil zincs used in the refrigerator condenser arrived and I put one of them in and stored the other two.

I unscrewed and removed the wooden shelves on which the salon bench cushions sit to expose the two fresh water tanks. Each tank has two "viewing ports" namely six inch diameter 3/16th inch aluminum disks, each held in place over a blue rubber gasket with six metal screws to cover a hole in the tops of the tanks.

Then the manual dinghy pumpout pump could be inserted into the tanks and about eight gallons of water pumped out, and the last half inch sponged out, leaving only dampness. Once the two tanks dry, their interiors with lots of oxidation, can be scraped, vacuumed out and washed (last rinse an alcohol wash with cheap vodka), before the whole thing can be put back together. The only other time I did this was in 2010, so I suppose the tanks will be due for another such clean out in 2022. And John, see next paragraph, suggested I use real rubber gaskets and save a lot of labor in scraping the blue liquid gasket material from the bottom of the plates and the top of the tanks.

I can't say enough about John, who came up from Maryland's eastern shore for a few days and brought along his very expensive German "Fostner" drill bits for my work on the cabin sole.

He created a jig or tool to make for a smooth cut, consisting of a piece of plywood with holes cut through it for the size of the various bits. We drilled out four "dings"

and we even inserted glue and a bung into one of them. The next step was chiseling off the top of the bung and sanding it flush. My chisel was very dull so John sharpened it with my Dremel tool, metal file and 400 grit sandpaper. I took two of the many panels of one inch thick plywood that comprise the cabin sole home and next day sanded one down and acquired the polyurethane and brush to apply it. Lots of progress on all fronts. When I get the rest of the dings drilled or sanded out I will carefully wrap and box the bits and send them back to John.

And it was not all work: Three boating related play days:
Dinner at an Indian restaurant followed by dramatic readings of plays by a young award winning playwright at the New York Arts Club with Rhoda and Lloyd, of "Jazzsail."
I attended a very pleasant and efficient business meeting at the Harlem YC. With the depression ending, things are looking up for our Club with cost reductions, increased membership and plans to attract younger members with new programs for smaller boats and running in the black for the last two years.  After the meeting came Brazil Night, an all-Brazilian special menu (Hearts of palm salad, Feijoada and Flan with two glasses of wine and coffee for only $40, tax and tip and a performance by a troupe of that unique Brazilian martial art/acrobatic/dancing art, all for only $40.)
And we celebrated Thanksgiving at our home with a five course dinner for nine that I cooked -- six family and three friends, and all except two of them having sailed with us, including John, who had come up from Maryland.

Honeymoon Passage 2002 -- a "Near Death Experience"?

This sea story is 14 years old. It occurred during our honeymoon in August 2002. My beloved calls it our "near death experience," one dark and stormy night, but she exaggerates. I think you will find it exciting despite my customary low key unemotional account of it, the only key I know

We sailed our Tartan 34, also called ILENE. (We could have called ILENE, "ILENE II" but I feared it would have sounded too much like a rustic woodland shelter--"leanto" -- on the radio.) She was very fast for its length. We had spent a couple of days going from New York City to Block Island, where we met up with other, longer and faster Tartans for a two week group trip to Maine with TONE (Tartan Owners of New England).

One fact that caused our problem was my lack of knowledge as to the amount of diesel fuel we had aboard. Our first boat, Just Cause, a Pearson 28, had a very simple gauge to measure how much fuel was left -- in that case gasoline.  A thin teak stick was inserted from the fill hole, located in the cockpit sole, directly down about two feet until it touched the bottom of the fuel tank. It had lines scribed in it for half and quarter full. When you pulled it out, the wet part told you how full the tank was. (Like a dip stick measures your oil.) The more modern boats do not have a straight path from the fill to the tank bottom, and so gauges have replaced the unbreakable stick, but the gauges never work.

We had filled our tank in Old Saybrook CT and with light summer winds had motored to Block Island. Our next passage was also a light wind day, and being shorter and hence rated slower, we left Block Island before the other boats in the group, and motored for Onset, Mass., at the juncture of Buzzards Bay and the Cape Cod Canal. But the others soon caught up and asked me if I could crank on a few more rpms. "Sure!"   Oh, I forgot to mention how blisteringly hot it was that day. After a while the overheating alarm piped up and we shut down the engine. I called on the VHF and told the others to proceed -- we would catch up. I checked out the engine for possible causes of the overheating and this took me longer than it would a trained mechanic, maybe half an hour. During that time the ladder that closes the engine compartment was off, exposing the engine to relatively cooler air while we drifted safely but slowly on the near glassy surface of eastern Block Island Sound. Finding nothing wrong, we turned the engine back on, the heat alarm did not sound, and we proceeded, under motor, but without those extra rpms.

We got to Onset in time for the party but after the fuel dock had closed for the night; no problem, we can fill up in the morning, before we leave. Except that the six hour period when the tide was fair in the Cape Cod Canal ended rather early in the morning. We had to leave Marion at daybreak, before the fuel dock opened, or wait until the afternoon. The group's plan was to transit the Canal, cross Cape Cod Bay passing Provincetown to starboard, continue across the Stellwagen Banks, the Bay of Maine, known as Bigelow Bight, pass Monhegan Island to port, enter Penobscot Bay and head up its west coast to reach our destination, Tenant's Harbor, Maine, the next morning after a passage of about 160 miles, which would take close to 27 hours at a 6 knot pace.

After motoring through the canal on the tail end of that fair tide we should have pulled in to the marina at its far end, to starboard, in Sandwich Mass and fueled up there. But I didn't. And the day's wind was again light, with the wind from behind us. So crossing Cape Cod Bay we were motor sailing and hence using more of our fuel. We also declined to detour into Provincetown for fuel. My mistakes. Bravado and the desire not to fall behind. After all, we are a sailboat, right?

In those days I had not yet figured out how to measure fuel consumption by keeping track of engine hours, so as to compute, from tank capacity and burn rate, how many hours I could run the engine before we would run out.

One bad experience near mid day was an accidental jibe as we were crossing the Stellwagen Banks on a near dead starboard run. Lene was hanging towels to dry on the port lifelines. She got whacked on the side of her head by the boom. Fortunately, she was hit when the boom had reached the very end of its swing, rather than potentially being thrown out of the boat if she had been hit mid arc. We were also fortunate, regarding that jibe, that the wind was light. The boom's swing was not very fast. A proper preventer line, which we have now, would have prevented the jibe. Lene sat, with ice in a towel held against her head and cried. All I could do was tell her how sorry I was while I continued to steer the boat. Thankfully, after an hour or so her mood brightened. The bump took longer to go down. But this close encounter with the potentially deadly boom is not what she refers to as our "near death experience". We continued, crossing the Stellwagen Banks, but without sighting any of the whales that cavort there.

The wind gently pushed us along all day and a storm was predicted for the night. We were flying the big Genoa and the full main, to get as much speed as we could without the engine. There was more wind pushing us along as the day wore on but the boat was not setting any speed records. We were not making any six knots.

After dinner and before dark we reefed the main and furled the genoa in precaution because a storm was predicted. This slowed us, but better safe than sorry. When the storm came up, it was a big nothing for us. A few gusts of wind but only twenty drops of rain and a vast quantity of lightning. But the lightning was from under the horizon, off stage. We neither heard thunder nor saw the bolts, but the skies all around us were bright as day when the fireworks exploded radiating light from under the horizon to the heavens.

And then it was over. No storm, no rain, no more lightning -- and almost no wind. But let's be patient; so we waited another hour to make sure the storm was really gone. Finally, maybe ten or eleven p.m., we shook the reef out of the big main, unfurled the big 153 racing genny and picked up speed.

And shortly, the wind came back, except now it was in front of us, from the northeast, and we were close hauled. The Tartan had a 6' 3" keel and pointed very well -- we were moving again and fast. But the wind kept building. Yep, a Nor'easter!  And the bearing to the mouth of Penobscot Bay was northeast. Too much sail up. We had to reduce sail to gain control and reduce heeling. We tried to furl the Genoa, but Lene was a lot newer to sailing, especially at night in a storm. I handled the lines, and a flailing jib sheet slapped against the main sail, tearing a seam. Unfortunately the tear was above the main's reefing cringle. If the tear had been below the cringle, we could have simply gathered the lower part of the main into the bunt of the reef and proceeded under the reefed main, which was our planned next step anyway. But the tear forced us to drop the main entirely, wrap it up, and proceed under Genoa alone. I'm pretty handy with needle and thread, but sewing that seam was a long daylight job in calm conditions, not standing on the coach roof in the dark in a howling wind.  Well one good thing: not much rain that night.

(We also found that the compass light was not working but were able to rig a flashlight above it and keep replacing its batteries)

I never thought to go back -- put the wind behind us. This would have reduced apparent wind speed by ten knots and permitted the waves to help us rather than slam down our boat speed, time and again. But what port would we put into? It would have to be one that we had never been to before. And at night in the storm? At least if we continued it would be light before we arrived.

The engine would not have propelled us much in the big seas that the winds were whipping up -- whether working with the Genoa or without. We tried. The boat was pitching too much, with the prop rising out of the water when the bow slanted down, thus exposing the prop to cavitation. This would not do the engine or prop any good nor move the boat forward very much.

Oh yes, we were tacking and my thought was that we were safer further from the rocky Maine shore than nearer. We had never yet visited the beautiful Isles of Shoals, but on the chart they looked big, rocky and ugly. Even their name evokes fear. They were nearer the coast.  The coast of lower Maine is a big bay -- Bigelow Bight. If we tacked north, in toward shore, and then east, back out again to the rhumb line, we would have averaged closer to shore. I elected instead to go east, away from shore and then north, back to the rhumb line, to stay in deeper waters. We ended up at one point about 40 miles off the coast, which Lene considers an error in my judgement to this day. I guess she is right. The rhumb line was far from the Isles of Shoals, which are only seven miles off the coast. But hypothermia would have finished us off in minutes whether we were one mile or 40 miles off shore. With what I know now, we were foolhardy in going off shore without a proper life raft and EPIRB. Our dinghy was no substitute for the former. It would have been swamped by the big waves in seconds and the water's of Maine will kill a person by hypothermia in a matter of minutes. We were lucky.

Lene asked me to call the Coast Guard.  I told her that they would ask: Are your lives are in danger? Do you wish to abandon ship?" If not, their job is to help us contact a commercial towing company to tow us if we need to be towed. This was before Alfie Girl and Witty were born and Lene wanted to say "Yes!" But I was not considering abandoning ship. I went below for a few minutes to consult the cruising guides and charts. We seemed to be about equidistant from Tenant's Harbor and Portland. I elected Portland, though it was far from the destination of the others in the group, because more repair facilities were located there. We radioed to let the others know not to expect us for the next few days. Another boat, relayed that message to them for us because we were more than 20 miles from them, out of VHF radio range.

It started to get light before daybreak and by late morning we saw the red and white buoy "P", standing outside Casco Bay, in which Portland Harbor is located. N 43 degrees, 31.6; W 70 degrees 05.5 minutes. Lene was exultant. But Portland was north of us in Casco Bay about 11 miles away, and that bay has many islands and shoals. And the wind had not diminished. We tacked our way up the Bay and tuned into Portland Harbor. When we pulled into the inner harbor we furled the sail and headed, under motor, straight for DeMillo's fuel dock where ILENE took a big drink, though her tank was by no means empty. But I would not want to have guessed wrong on that issue and tried to pull onto an unknown dock under genoa in big winds.

Then to Portland Yacht Services, which offers dockage and a mooring field and provides a home to many marine service contractors. They directed us to their mooring field but Lene got on the radio and told them that they WOULD give us dockage! They agreed when I added that we needed repairs. We were on the dock at about 5:30 p.m., about 36 hours after we has set out at daybreak the day before. Lene had gone below for a few hours of rest during the passage, I did not.

The yard told us they would scope out our work requests the next morning, the primary one being the repair of the mainsail. Much of our clothing and bed clothes had gotten wet, or at least damp. The dorades, which are supposed  let in ventilating air but filter out sea water, were great, but after being heeled over so far for so long they had let some of the seawater that was being sprayed up over the bow into the cockpit. So hot showers in the yard, fresh dry linens on the bed and Lene made a delicious pasta dinner before a very long good night's sleep. She recalls that I fell asleep while standing up making up the V berth, and that my head lay on the table while eating her dinner.

I had another fear, one that I did not tell Lene about until after we were safely tied to the dock. What if the Genoa had been ripped apart by the force of the wind? Then we would have had no good means of propulsion out in the wind storm. But that did not happen.

In the morning the local sailmaker came, took off our main, promised to bring it back fixed the next day -- and he kept his promise. It is amazing how cooperative the recreational maritime industry is, when possible, in fixing things promptly so cruising sailors can get on with their cruises.

(It was a racing sail, made of many panels of high tech fabric stitched together. Racing sails hold their optimal curved shape until the end of their life, when they fall apart. One panel had flown apart and the sailmaker warned us that this would now continue to happen, and it did, three weeks later, when we were near home. Racing sails increase speed but cost a lot more and do not last near as long. Ah the learning curve never ends. We got home at Labor Day and bought a new sail during the winter.)

In Portland, when everything was fixed I heard the best words possible from my new bride, my mate. What I feared hearing was: "I'm flying home and I'll see you back in New York!" But instead Lene asked:  "Where do we go next?" My reply:  "I married the right girl!" The remainder of our three weeks together in Maine and coming home, were great fun, but not the subject of this post.

I hope you enjoyed this sea story.

October 16 - November 2 -- Five Work Days -- 24 Hours Total

Lots of work getting ILENE ready for winter. And the fun days were not sailing related.
Fun was seeing Lene star in a one act play in a night of eight such plays called "Repercussions," twice, and Nathan Lane in "The Front Page", once. Also a five day visit to my oldest daughter and her family in Oregon where I chaperoned my granddaughter's Halloween party for about 40 eighth graders, visited the local museum of art, and enjoyed a delicious brunch with Judy and Meridel, who connected with us in Turks and Caicos in 2012. I attended the 55th reunion of the Bergenfield HS class of 1961; had a skin problem biopsied -- and it is not cancer; lunched in New Jersey with cousin Judy and enjoyed a lecture by the Administrator of the Department of Labor's Wage-Hour Division, who enforces some of our labor laws at Cornell's ILR School's New York City offices.
The boat work:
+ Replaced remaining halyards with messenger lines.
+ Untangled them from the remaining lines that descend from the mast and wrap those around the mast so they won't slap against the mast all winter.
+ I screwed up in placement of first reefing line: I put a big knot in the end as a stopper so that I would not draw that end into and through the boom. But I placed the knot on the bottom instead of the top of the boom so that I succeeded in drawing the knot to the inside of the forward end of the boom where I will have to attempt to retrieve it with the snake next spring. Sometimes I am an idiot.
+ Rigged the whisker pole forward and the 2 x 4 from the aft end of the boom to the radar arch -- to complete the ridge line for the canvas cover.
+ Washed the topsides and tested for rust removal and cleaning of the waterline with chemicals; it will work.
+ Braced up the boom from the cockpit sole with another piece of 2 x 4.
+ Winterized the engine with five minutes help from Ilene. Located in the cockpit, she turned the engine on, waited until she saw the pink antifreeze come pumping out of the exhaust and turned the engine off again. I was in the cabin (with the ladder to the cockpit connecting us removed to gain access to the engine) pouring the antifreeze into the raw water strainer, leading to the engine's water pump.
+ Drained the hot water heater, disconnected its intake and output hoses from it and to each other and winterized the fresh water hoses with ten minutes help from the Huguenot's Orlando who poured the pink stuff into the fresh water pump via a hose and funnel while I raced around turning on each of twelve hot and cold shower and sink faucets until they each flowed pink.
+ Winterized both heads.
+ Winterized the salt water wash-down pump and the air conditioner, except the latter was still full of antifreeze, because it not used this past season.
+ Checked the sacrificial zinc in the refrigerator's condenser and I need to order some new ones though I checked and I do have new spares of the other three zincs that protect the propeller and its shaft.
+ Drained the sump under the engine and the bilge.
+ Used emery cloth to clean corrosion from the tangs of all the battery cables, bringing nice shiny copper into view, and reattached them to the battery posts.
+ Removed six of the wooden bars that hold the seven heavy batteries in place. Without them the boat would bounce the batteries around. These had become weak and blackened by battery acid and will be used as models for new ones to be fabricated -- no bouncing expected during the winter.
+ Removed the bimini and took it to Doyle Sails-Island Nautical canvas shop for (a) cleaning, (b) replacement of the clear plastic window aft center for viewing aloft, which had become clouded with exposure and dirt in the last decade, and (c) reinforcement (patching) the front edge which had become worn and frayed by many handholds during the same period.
+ Covered the boat with its canvas winter blanket, placed padding at the chafe points and tied all of the strings that hold the cover in place, under the bottom, from side to side.
I did the cover all myself except the hardest part, the aft half, for which serendipitously, I met Ken, a stranger, at the right moment. He is a Civil War re-enactor. In uniform with a big drum at his hip, he was walking back to his home near Yankee Stadium when he saw me. He asked several intelligent questions and I invited him aboard for a tour of the boat which he eagerly accepted. And he offered to help, at just the right time. The only problem we encountered with the huge complicated piece of canvas is that perhaps because I laid the bimini's stainless steel framing hoops atop the 2 x 4, where it is out of the way, rather than in the cockpit, or because I tightened up the front half too much, too soon, we could not get the last zipper, at the port quarter, the one I replaced this summer, to close -- about half an inch gap. So Ken, who said he is a tailor as well, sewed it up like I did last winter. I gave Ken our boat card and if he calls in March or April, as he said he would, he will have a boat ride.

So ILENE is ready for the winter, but with a list of winter projects. I'm listing them here with the hope that by doing do, I will have challenged myself to actually get them all done this winter before working on the bottom and recommissioning for the next season.
1. Repair wood for insertion of new Perco latch in center of salon sole.
2. Call Groco expert and with his advice, repair aft head so it does not "spit" while flushing -- maybe it is only the joker valve.
3. R
Drill holes and use bungs to remove dings in cabin sole and refinish it -- about 20 pieces of it. This is the biggest job and i can use the cabin, if covered with drop cloths, as a cat free workshop, but only when it is warm enough for each coat of polyurethane.
4. Restore operability of the door to the forward head so it can be closed and locked.
5. Open the fresh water tanks, clean their interior, and reseal.
6. Figure out why the self tailing feature of the starboard coach roof winch is not operating consistently.
7. Get a faux teak panel cut and installed to dress up the deck of the swim platform.
Enough to keep me busy this winter?

September 29 -- October 16 -- Two More Sails, Hauling and "Going Out of Commission" Closed Out the 2016 Sailing Season

Left to right: Fred, Sophie and Mike. The next to last sail this season took place during the afternoon of the second day of  Rosh Hashonna, usually a good day to sail weather wise. Two members of the Torah Study Group, Mike, an attorney, and her Honor, our former mayor, Sophie, joined me as did Fred, who lives in our apartment house and was responsible for setting up the gym Lene and I use. Fred is also a sailor, on J-24s at the marina by the World Trade Center. I began the sail impressively, by motoring over the pickup stick of a vacant mooring and getting it caught against he rudder! I don't hold back on reporting my miscues. We got off by pushing the line down with the boat hook. No harm. Look where you are going, Roger! We sailed into Little Neck Bay, all the way to the southern end where the boats are all on moorings. Mike lived in the area and provided commentary. we were close hauled coming out and did four tacks to get through the channel off Kings Point, before falling off a bit and heading around Hart Island and for home. Good weather and decent wind.

The season's last sail was a sad one, though everyone had a good time. This was not the first time that our group took Nick out from the Hebrew Home for the Aged in Riverdale for a day of sailing. Nick was a master carpenter and wood worker and dance instructor. He had a boat at the Harlem and claims he taught John, another now former Harlem man, how to sail. John came up all the way from Oxford, MD for the trip. The others on board were Pat, the only other current Harlemite, who is an RN and provided strong, gentle and expert care for Nick. Nick's memory and physical agility have sadly deteriorated since our last sail with him. Don is also a former Harlemite and Harry. a long time friend and client of Nick's rounded out the crew. Here is Nick with John. I regret that I screwed up the lovely photos of the other guys which Pat sent me and this post is way overdue.

We had lots of wind at the start, so I put in a reef and we beat out past Execution Rocks. Near green can "1", off New Rochelle, we hove to for lunch. I had read about this technique but never done it before. By back winding the small jib to the wrong side and locking the wheel over to the other side and adjusting the sheets we got a very stable platform for lunch while drifting, at about 20 degrees off the port bow at 1.2 knots. A neat trick and I will try it again in stronger winds. Lene will love having  stability during her time in the galley. It is only possible because I installed "regular" sheets to the small jib this year in addition to the self tacking one. Thanks guys. We expected to fly back with the wind behind us but it died down so we shook out the reef and ILENE headed back much more slowly than she had gone out. Pat insisted on buying a light dinner at the Club for everyone at the end of a good day. But alas, future socializing with Nick will most likely not be afloat.

The work days, included three of only an hour each involved with the winterization of the water maker, engine and air conditioner (with help from Lene with the motor from the cockpit while I poured antifreeze in from inside the cabin with the ladder between cockpit and cabin removed to provide access to the engine) and a four hour day in between on which I drove ILENE from City Island to the Huguenot YC in New Rochelle for hauling and then stripped the sails from the boat. The fifth work day, was when I took the sails off the boat, folded them, brought the main to Doyle Sails for work and the other two to our upstairs locker at the Harlem and lifted the aft half of the winter cover to ILENE's deck, plus removing lifelines and stanchions and running messenger lines up the mast to be able to restore the halyards to their positions atop the mast from where I removed them for washing. A seven hour day and with the heavy lifting my back was a bit sore.

GOC was its usual friendly but more formal (tie and jacket) self, a time to talk with friends after the season with the traditional flag lowering ceremony and a time for distributing prizes to the racers. Jeep, our retiring Commodore announced that the Club had actually operated in the black, by several thousand dollars, in each of the past two years -- money to be spent on improvements. Good news; no assessment or dues increase in the offing.

September 12 - 28 -- Mostly Mountains -- But Some Sailing Too

Yes Lene and I took a nine day Globus bus tour out of Calgary Canada with her brother and his wife, Mike and Linda.

We enjoyed breathtakingly beautiful majestic vistas, like Bierstadt paintings, only real. And good food, good companions and easy living with the driving done by experts.






 But I also managed to get some water related activities in, though not sailing.


Lake Waterton is a beauty on which I took a ride on the 1928 m/v "International,"

which has been taking tourists from the town of Waterton in Canada to Goat Haunt, Montana. There a Border Agent will admit you to the US -- if you want to walk a far piece to the nearest town. The boat was pretty and has been used exclusively for its current purpose for almost 90 years.






On the way back I noticed this small weird shadow on the eastern side of the lake and turned to see what caused it.

Another such boat trip was on Maligne Lake a half hour drive upstream from Jasper. This time the boat was rather unremarkable, one of seven on the lake. It was run by two young women who took turns driving and tour directing. The Garmin showed depths in meters, and was not needed because the lake is deep everywhere. It also showed SOG but in kilometers per hour! Its registry document said it was to be operated by a crew of three but....    It ran a straight shot to the landing half way down the long lake and slowed only to avoid creating wakes for the few canoeists.

We also had some river experiences. In Fort Steele, a semi-reconstructed, semi-original 1890's town, the museum showed a model of an unusually broad and flat stern wheel driven boat used to carry lead ore from the mines to the railroad. It operated for only about three years and only in spring when the water was deep enough.

Later we walked on a river

-- that's right -- a frozen river, Athabasca Glacier. Thousands go there every day, even in the shoulder season, and our presence and heat and dust are contributing to the gradual end of the glacier, currently losing its mass. The next picture shows a bus and two small tiny horizontal dashes in the ice. These are parked busses!

Later we were among 17 folks in a big inflatable raft steered by our guide with two oars from oarlocks amidships to keep us abeam to the current during our six miles on the glacially cold Athabasca River, down to just above the small town of Jasper.

But you prefer to hear about the sailing. Only three days.

One was with Peter, who was of ILENE's crew on the trip from Hampton VA to Tortola in November 2011, in the earliest days of this blog. We were out there for about four hours of pleasant sailing in light wind, through Hart Island Sound, into Manhasset Bay to the Race Committee float, past Kings Point and home In Manhasset Bay portion of the journey the wind died completely so the engine had to be used. Peter had the helm as much as he wanted and we reminisced. We passed and circled this schooner which hauls tourists out of New York. Light wind, like I said.

After Canada I sailed with Vic, my successor as President of our congregation,

30 years ago. He brought his three grandsons: Levi, Madden and Jagger. We had lunch in the salon after a "Cooks Tour" of the interior and sailed for about four hours. We went over to near King's Point and then under the bridges to the huge prison barge opposite Rikers Island before heading home by much the same route. Wind was out of the north and light at the start so we used the Genoa and main, but later when the wind got stronger, I switched to the smaller headsail. Levi had been to a sailing training camp in the BVIs this summer and wanted to go through the channel to Flushing and LaGuardia Airport, because of his interest in aviation, but it would have been a beat on the way back north so I said no. All three of the lads had the helm and did very well. The tide was flooding throughout our sail so westbound we made a very slow SOG, but we rushed back with favorable tide. Vic and I shared some red and then we had an early light dinner at the Club. A wedding was taking place there which slowed service a bit.
The most recent sail was what may be the last excursion of the Old Salts. There were seven of us and it was the shortest OS sail on record. It was blowing quite a bit at the mooring so I started out with a reefed main. Once out there, no longer protected by the lee of the Island the wind was stronger. With the addition of the small jib we were making 7.8 SOG without tidal effect. Mike, who had the helm, was having trouble steering, and we were heeled more than was comfortable for some of the ladies. The wind meter was showing 32 wind speed units. So I furled the jib, tacked and headed back for what was probably the longest noshing and drinking session in OS history, including more than three bottles of wine.
           Mike, Sandy, Marsha, me, Debra and Sarah. Thanks, Matt for the picture
.

And one four hour work day. It was unusual in that every one of the four items on my list of chores actually got done: 1) Clean out the raw water strainer and replace all of the three filters which it feeds to the water maker, commission it and make one hour of water. Soon I have to pickle the water maker again for the winter. It was not needed this summer but has to be maintained nonetheless. 2) Top off the remaining battery cells with distilled water. 3) Check the chart chips in the chart plotter to have the serial number for my complaint to Jeppersen that there was a blind spot between the Throggs Neck and the Hellsgate Bridges with no chart. Turns out that there is chart coverage of this busy area, but only at the 3/4 mile scale, which I had not tried. 4) Complete installation and screwing in of the new stanchion and reinsertion of the port lifelines through it and reattachment of them to the bow pulpit.
And one day for a delightful leisurely lunch in New Jersey with Jim, former captain of "Aria" and he gave me some excellent sailing books, some of which I've donated to the Club's library; others are keepers.
And with the official arrival of fall, the weather threatens to be as nasty as it was pleasant this summer.

September 6-11 -- Including a Wedding and a "Funeral".

Three sail days. averaging 2.5 hours. First was Old Salts after lunch went off promptly after all the problems with service the week before.  Mark, of Deuce of Hearts, accepted my invitation to sail on ILENE, I think his first time. He helmed through Hart Island Sound which was tricky because we came close hauled, and out past the red buoy marking No Nations rocks. Then a rookie, Sarah, a new social member, took over and did well deeply into Manhasset Bay, about a half mile past the racing barge and back out to Big Tom. I took over and sailed between the rock and the Island. The other three aboard were regulars. The refreshments were aboard ILENE, where we were joined by four of the five, including Bennett, who had sailed on Ohana.
The next day after a few hours of boat chores I got picked up by Rhoda and we sailed Jazz Sail over essentially the same route as the day before. I brought my whipping kit along but found that I had whipped the ends of most of her lines on a prior trip. The genoa sheet was new and its ends are now properly whipped. I noticed that the boat's main, when fully and tightly raised, ends about 14 inches (estimate) below the top of the mast. Also, the sail's foot ends about the same distance short of the aft end of the boom. In other words, it appears that the boat can carry a larger mainsail. Rhoda took photos and will check out my theory with Catalina. The more pressing problem however, as we are entering the stormy season, is the wobbly nature of the attachment of the port bow cleat to the boat. At least the starboard one is secure. We had dinner at Archies, our first time there, and were pleased with the food.
An "O" (Other -- related to sailing but not sailing or living or working aboard) was for the wedding of Erica, daughter of our friends Bruce and Linda, former Harlemites, at the Mamaroneck Yacht Club. A lovely wedding and we met two other former Harlemite couples, PC Tex and Maria, and Ken and Linda, who have recently gone over to power boating. The other three couples at our table were all Huguenot power boaters.
Finally, a day sail with the three adult children of Joel and Leticia, Harlemites who died in the past few years. My friend Jim, formerly of "Aria," set up the day for us. I got some boat chores done and the boat completely ready to go before they arrived, including a reef in the main because the winds were strong. The primary purpose of the sail was the dispersal of the ashes of their parents who loved sailing and were very active Harlem sailors though I had never sailed with them. The guests declined my offer to provide a religious component to the ceremony because their parents were secular ethical humanists. The scattering took about 20 minutes near Execution Rocks, with the mourners seated on the starboard coach roof between the mast and the dodger. There was weeping and appropriately I kept away from them, at the helm, during this time, keeping on port tack on a near  beam reach, with the wind slightly aft of the beam to reduce heeling. It served a cathartic purpose for them, I believe. The rest of our time together was pleasant, social and happy. They had brought snacks and wine and we had a very light early dinner at the club after returning to the mooring.

In my religion there are three major commandments or "mitzvahs": "Visit the sick. Comfort the bereaved. And rejoice with the bride and groom." During this period no one was sick but I was able to accomplish the other two.

What is happening?

From Aug 26 to date there has been a vast increase in the readership if this blog. From 30 page views per day to about 150. I'm not complaining; I write this for public consumption. But I'm curious. Have I done something right? Any explanatory comments would be appreciated. thank you. Roger

Wednesday to Labor Day -- first six days back

Wednesday I lowered the dink, tied up the davit bar, drove the dink to the dock, unlocked and removed the outboard and took it to the locker, deflated the dink using the pump to suck all the air out of it to make it smaller, tied it up, and, with friends, hauled it upstairs in the locker house and into the locker where itislocked up for the winter. Amazingly, while it was getting soft on cool fall-like evenings, I never had to pump more air into it since I pumped it up in mid June. Lene did the laundry.

The afternoon was the Old Salts sail. The only problem was lunch, which our restaurant fouled up completely by not having food. We waited two hours and then half of us left without lunch. Things like this have got to stop. It's no good for the would-be diners, and not good for the Club either, which needs its members to patronize its restaurant. Things came off the rails this time and it must not happen again. There were 15 of us and I sailed with about half of them on Bennett's "Ohana" and  the others on Mark's "Deuce of Hearts". I took ILENE out of circulation this week until her transformation from "cruising/live aboard" status back to a day sailer could be completed. Two and a half pleasant hours underway followed by the customary appetite ruination aboard Ohana. Two new faces. Lisa, is a new non-boat owning member whose family keeps a big power boat. The week before had been her debut session with us and she repeated this time on the same boat, Deuce of Hearts. I told her that next week she must join a keel boat to become a real sailor by getting the sensation of heeling. The other newcomer, this also his second time, was Bob, a friend of Marcia, who helmed Ohana a lot.

Thursday I took the outboard up to Island Outboard for adjustment and winter service -- except not the oil changes due to the little use she got this summer, I estimate less than eight hours. And then Lene and I filled our mini SUV with stuff, including the kitties and their stuff and transitioned to our urban apartment. Funny thing that night. Lene was laying by my right side, as she does aboard. When I got up in the middle of the night she said "What are you doing?!"  Well, I was climbing over her like I have to do in the Pullman berth when we are aboard! At home it is not needed because I can get up from the left side of the bed. Force of habit.

Friday I spent about three hours on the boat, test-installing the replacement stanchion, packing up a second carload of stuff and preparing ILENE for the expected arrival of hurricane Hermine:
chafing gear on the mooring pennants, tighter wrapping of the roller furled headsails, closer positioning of the anchor, and removal of blocks and lines that could be whipping around in a big blow. Mark and Marcia invited me to join them on "Leeds the Way", out of Minnefords South Marina. Also joining us were Walt and Rita and a couple from our hosts' ski club. Into Manhasser Bay for two hours a of sailing. I trimmed a bit.  Dinner after at Artie's.

Saturday through Monday we visited our friend Lianne in her home in Great Barrington and brought Ellen along.  We were joined for dinners by Susan and Stan, did theater and visited Leanne's son and his family in Kinderhook NY. No sailing, but all was not lost. Herman Mellville, author of Moby Dick, which got such big play in New Bedford, wrote that Great American Novel in his home, Arrowhead, in Pittsfield. I learned a lot during a guided tour of the house by a very well informed docent, Jeff Aldrich, who intends to enter graduate school in American Colonial History soon. The view from Mellville's study of Mt. Greylock, the highest in Massachusetts, was excellent and he wrote that he saw in its ridgeline the back and tale of a whale. Moby Dick was a huge commercial and popular failure when published in the 1850's. It was not recognized for its genius until 70 years later, long after he was buried. Between New Bedford, a few weeks ago, and The Berkshires, now, lies most of the latitude of Massachusetts and a whole lot of whaling content.

Day 39 -- August 30 -- HOME. -- HYC, Eastchester Bsy. -- 25.6 nm

We left Northport at 9:45, sailing off the mooring. The first ten miles were fine sailing on various port reaches. But once out of of Huntington Bay and off Eatons Neck, we were headed east with the wind behind us and there was not enough of it. I tried wing on wing and heading 40 degrees off course to "hot it up" as the racers say, but no luck. Against the tidal flow we were making 2.5 to 3 knots over the ground. Columbus could handle this or worse, but we don't have to...the engine was deployed. Arrived at home mooring 2 pm.  Lene took the bus and subway to our apartment to get our  car. I cleaned the boat. We will live aboard tonight and tomorrow night, as we did before the cruise, before returning with Witty and Alfie to our apartment,

So:
39 days, 28 of them in Massachusetts.
22 passages to 22 ports, 8 of them new ones, with 16 lay days.
766 nautical miles.
Only one day of rain --  1.5 hours while underway -- and a few nights; but even more unusual: NO FOG!
A fun time.
Now if I can get my laptop to work or learn how to add pictures via edits to posts is iPad,  you will soon get photo illustration.

And summer is not over yet.

Day. 38 -- August. 29 -- Northport -- 36.7 nm

Underway from 8:30 to 4:15. It should have been a straight shot from the New Haven breakwater to G "13", off Eatons Neck, the entrance to Huntington Bay, off which Northport is a busy cove. We had sails up all the way, but the motor on as well most of the way as well while we tacked first across the Sound to Near Port Jeff and then back across again to near Norwalk, before heading to Huntington. The tide was foul from 10 a.m. Northport is our only stop on Long Island on this cruise though earlier this season we did visit Cold Spring Harbor and Sheepshead Bay, both on the Island.
We did have a half hour of blissful close hauled sailing when the wind came up but there were no waves yet. ILENE seemed so happy to be slicing through the water so cleanly. But then as suddenly as it started it was over and we furled sails and motored through Huntington Bay to our mooring, provided by Seymours. This may have been the first time I entered Northport, after perhaps ten trips, which was not a weekend day and there was no wind. Normally both the wind and the other boats provide a challenge.
The only challenge was the black flies which have congregated on ILENE, the last few low-wind days. They like to bite our ankles, which a spray diminishes but does not eliminate. There were at least fifty of them today, standing on the stern of the boat except when they came forward to bite us. And as on the other days, once we come to port they seem to vanish, thank goodness. Is there any insect expert who can explain this phenomenon? And speaking of insects, we saw no Mosquitos this whole trip. Is is extra precaution taken by public health officials in an attempt to ward off the Zima virus?
We went out for dinner, this our last night "on the road".  Tomorrow we expect to arrive back at the Harlem.
I did an analysis of our food bills during the first two complete monthly billing cycles of the credit card we use. These cycles were since we moved aboard in June. About 29% of our total food budget is spent in restaurants, as compared to groceries. This statistic has to be taken with a grain of salt because a small amount of credit card charges in grocery stores is for non-food items and some food eaten "out" is in coffee shops where cash is paid. But we eat well and inexpensively by cooking our own food.
A calm cool night.

Day 37. -- August 28. -- New Haven YC -- 30 nm

Some folks, alright, it was Ilene, have suggested that yesterday's post was boring. Well it is true that it was closer to a log than a diary, but I do not get bored by sailing and enjoy the changes that the different conditions compel me to confront. And there were not many land activities to report on in Niantic. In fact I have answered a friend's question: "Do you ever get bored with sailing?" with a question of my own: "Do you ever get bored making love with your wife?"

That said, today's passage, 30 miles by the direct route, was as close to boring as it gets. A nice warm sunny day with not enough wind to sail so the engine worked all day, 9:15 to 4:30, with the sails up but hardly contributing.

So what to do on such a day to add excitement? A three mile detour for a passage through the Thimble Islands, where I have never been. They are granite outcroppings that are private and have homes on them -- No trespassing. One can anchor in the passages between them, but holding is not good and cables run across from island to island.  There is little protection from the prevailing southwesterlies. Those are the reasons we did not anchor. Instead, we dropped sails for unimpeded maneuverability and took the tour. There are many buoys, navigational and mooring, and many islands and it took some figuring to make sure we were in the correct passage. A good day for it, with light winds, and we drove slowly. Many smaller power boats were on moorings inside, the folks just lolling about and enjoying doing nothing.

We have never been by boat to New Haven either. The marinas are quite deeply into the large, mostly industrial, mostly shallow harbor, near the city, several miles away. There were two anchorages. One is directly behind the massive sea walls that protects the harbor. We took the other, the New Haven Yacht Club, nestled in Morris Cove, on the eastern side of the harbor behind Lighthouse Point. They are friendly and offer a free mooring to transient cruisers and said it was available. But when we inquired we learned that it is too small in weight and in distance from other moorings for ILENE so we anchored about 100 yards away with plenty of snubbed chain out and enjoyed another of Lene's delicious home (boat) cooked dinners. The club appears to be small based on the number of its moorings, with most boats in the 20 to 30 foot range and the clubhouse is small and serves food only for parties. It probably thereby has low cost. Still, if we had more time on this cruise it would have been fun to lower the dink, spend a day and get to know the locals.
It was supposed to be a rather calm night, but despite being behind both the breakwater and Lookout Point, what wind there was rocked the boat. Not a comfortable night's sleep.

Day 36. August 27 -- Niantic YC -- 45.4 nm

Yes, from  Newport, which we left at 9, we had planned to go to Stonington CT, a lot closer to Newport than Niantic. But the tide turned fair just about when we were off Stonington, at about 2, so we kept going for another three hours to Niantic, where we had never been, always a plus for me, and dropped anchor, a calm night being predicted, at the edge of the YC's mooring field, at 5.
We raised sails in Newport Harbor and during the seven miles to Point Judith, heading 230 degrees magnetic, with the engine at 2000, tide and wind to starboard, we were going between 7 and 7.8 knots.
We rounded Point Judith at 10:45 and it brought up a lot of sad and scary memories in me of a prior encounter with Point Judith, before this blog began, a sea story which I will tell you about soon, though parts of it are written up in the decision of the arbitration panel of the admiralty reports.
From the Point the course was 270 for the 18.5 miles to Watch Hill Passage,  along the western half of the south coast of Rhode Island.
Before we left on this cruise I was talking with an actress friend of Lene's at a party in Hoboken who said she grew up in Charleston RI. "Never heard of it," I said. Well it's along that coast. That coast is sandy barrier beaches compared to the eastern part of the Atlantic coast of RI, which is rocky ledges giving way to harbors. "No boats in Charleson", I said. Well actually, I took a close look at the charts and at the coastline with binoculars and saw two tiny inlets, navigable by very shallow draft vessels, into Ninigret and Quonochontaug Ponds. There are no buoys marking the way in, no soundings indicating the depth inside and no references in cruising guides to either pond. In other words, they don't exist as far as cruisers or the Coast Guard are concerned. But if the folks who love them would consent and a developer with lots of money would dredge, they could become the next Lake Tashmoos or Cuttyhunks of this world.
Early in the passage along this coast there was no wind so I furled the Genoa and close hauled the main, to provide stability only, and we motored at 6.5, dropping down to 6. But 45 minutes later, at 11:30, the wind came back, off our port quarter so sails came out again to assist, which brought the boat back to 6.5. It was another clear sunny day, with a bit of haze but we saw Block Island all the way to Watch Hill passage. At 12:30, the boat speed came up to 6.7 knots so we turned off the engine and sailed the rest of the way, except for the last mile and a half. We started sailing at only 5.3 knots with wind on our port beam. With full sails, we were making half our apparent wind speed. When the wind got up to 12 apparent, we got up to 6.
We came through the passage at 7.1 knots at 1:50 p.m., though the tidal current was not supposed to get favorable until 2 p.m. In Fishers Island Sound and elsewhere today there wore small wind holes. Microbursts are narrow area, short duration, destructive winds, unlike hurricanes because of their small size and lack of a circular pattern. These wind holes were the negative matter of microbursts. We saw wind on the water's surface everywhere except for the area, perhaps 200 yards across, where we were, where there was none. We sort of had to coast through them. We passed Latimer Reef Light to starboard and a race at the Fishers Islsnd YC to port before passing between the Dumplings, passing Bartlett Reef to starboard and then heading NNWto the Niantic Bay YC. Those last four miles were exceedingly slow, the tide was bad and the wind light behind us. So we furled and motored the last mile and a half.
Our sole need to go ashore was to refill our three one gallon bottles of drinking and cooking water.  Before I had left for the YC on this mission, a couple in a dink came by and suggested we go in to town to see a movie. This entailed a dink ride of about one mile to the railroad and road bascule bridges and another half mile to Marker Seven Marina. The railroad's embankment cuts off the sea from the inner harbor, creating a sheltered spot. But the problem is that strong tidal currents run under the bridges through the narrow gap. It is suggested that sailors make this passage only at slack water.
No problem by dink, even on the return trip an the dark. We saw Indignation, based on a Phillip Roth
novel. Well acted and a bit strange.
A very peaceful night.

Days 33-35 -- August 24-26 -- Newport RI. -- 20.6 nm

Another cool morning. We dropped our Westport mooring at eight, and left Massachusetts waters after 28 day,  visiting 13 ports, including 6 new ones. On the way out, south bound, breakfast was eaten and once out to Westport's red and white buoy, for the next leg of 7.8 miles, west to the red and white at the mouth of the Sakonet River, the wind was in our face, but not strong, so we motored along at about five knots. Then we turned a bit to starboard and were able to use main and small jib instead of engine.
A funny thing happened as we were turning north to enter Narragansett Bay at about 11. I heard "Roger!" from a boat going the other way called  "Exit Strategy." A second later the same voice yelled "It's Michael!" He apparently knows ILENE, but unfortunately I did not recognize his boat or see his face. I asked for help on Facebook and one Harlemite, Jill,  knew his boat name and his name and that he was a former member. Another Harlem member, Ellen, then sent me his cell phone number and I called him and left a message. Thanks, ladies and thanks to science which can connect us all so well.
We gybed up to Newport harbor and sailed almost all the way in, way past Fort Adams, before dropping sails and motoring to the mooring, arriving at noon.
The public dinghy dock we used --  at Bowens Wharf --  one of several, is not large and not overly crowded given the large number of boats in this harbor. I sent off a Newport postcard to my granddaughter, and visited the Newport Art Museum, which I last visited in 2008. It is still focused almost exclusively on Rhode Island artists, but has added some contemporary works to the collection that formerly consisted of representational works from the 1870s to the 1920s, Newport's gilded age. Lene meanwhile found a lovely shaded outdoor coffee shop and called friends and read. We met up and did some grocery shopping before heading back to ILENE.
This harbor is crowded with boats of all types, except derelict boats. Some Fort Lauderdale-St. Maarten-Antigua behemoths, power and sail, some former America's Cup race winners now taking out tourists, and some lovely little wooden gems.
We walked the Cliff Walk -- most of it.  It runs 3.8 land miles along the eastern (more protected) side of Aquidneck Island, on which Newport is located. It is one of the city's most popular attractions and free.It hugs the rocky granite cliffs, reminiscent of Maine, at the edge of the sea, providing great views except in fog. The other side of the path abuts the back yards of the great seaside mansions, which they called cottages, that were built here in the 1880s and 1890s, including "Rough Point", Doris Duke's house and that of the Vanderbilts -- The Breakers. We figured out how to use the local bus system. The bus station is only a few blocks from the dink dock and the number 67 took us to near the far end of the Cliff Walk and after walking about three miles on it we got off and took the same route back from that point. ($2 fare, except sometimes they take only $1?)  I had never walked the southern part of this walk before, or as much of it. The sea views are magnificent and I learned the unique sound that a wave makes when receding from a beach made up of a deposit of small round rocks, a crackling sound. I had just never noticed before. Part of the walk is paved, but other parts are
a rock scramble. Lene's eyes are not what they used to be so I did what I
could to protect and guide her because, as I have noted in this blog years ago, if either of us falls and breaks a bone, the fun has to end. We also did some shopping. Lene occasionally gets herself into a
shopping frenzy, which can be cured only by the spending of some money. But seriously, our purchases were reasonable, shoes at Rockport and a new rubber rug for the galley sole, to replace the one that blew away off Greenwich on day one.
We had an early dinner at Scales and Shells, a fish house on Thames St., the main waterfront drag. I have eaten there almost every time I have visited Newport, starting over 20 years ago. It is the place I first tasted fried calamari and it was even better this time.
We had planned to stay only two days but the Admiral did not like the thought of beating into SW winds on the third day so we elected to stay an extra day, and push back our expected arrival date at the Harlem for a day. In fact in 2008, on our three month cruise of Maine, we did an overnight from  here and reached the Harlem pin one day.
We had to change moorings in the morning because the one we were on was reserved for someone else. And having raised the dink in anticipation of departure, we took the Olp Port Marine's public launch for the third day's shore activities ($3/person each way.) this made our return, at different times, easy. Lene took in the Tennis Hall of Fame and I visited Rough House and completed the Cliff Walk to its  southern end, again using the number 67 bus. I have toured The Breakers, which is more magnificent, several times. rough House was also built by a Vanderbilt, a different member of the family, but purchased by Doris Duke's parents and given to her. It is furnished with objects of art that she left in the house when she gave it the the foundation. The Breakers is one of about half a dozen mansions that are operated by a common trust. Rough House is separate and, I learned, charges the
highest admission, $25, for a very well docented tour. I also visited the new small museum of the history of Newport, free, and was surprised to learn that it ends with the gilded age.

Day 32 -- August 23 -- Westport Mass -- 12.2 nm

Underway 8 to 11 this morning. We should have used the Genoa because of light wind, but what's the rush. With NW wind we made the plotted line, on a very close reach until clearing The Wildcat, a bunch of rocks with an old wreck on it off Gooseberry Neck. Then we had to go more north and it was tacking to the mouth of the river. I had been to Westport twice before, but the last time was 1996 or earlier, because Lene had never been here.
The first time, it was a grey, stormy and foggy day. Two Mile Ledge had large breakers crashing on it which scared the heck out of the three or four small Harlem cruisers still outside, including me on my first boat, "Just Cause", a Pearson 28. We wanted to come in but did not have radar or GPS. Selwyn, my mentor,  and Evie, on their Tartan 31, "Evie F", slipped his mooring in the shelter of the harbor, came back out, located each of us on radar, came close enough for us to see him,
and told us via VHF to follow him and each other, single file, and led us in to safety. A good shepherd and a Good Samaritan.
Today it was chilly (jeans and foulie tops until we came inland) but clear and sunny and easy to find the river mouth and follow the buoys up the river. Moored boats on both sides of the river also mark the channel. There are a lot more moorings here than last time.
The Westport River is the harbor, with a curving channel running through it as well as a tidal current of up to three knots. We had reservations with Tripp, but first wanted to refuel. The fuel dock had a large power boat fueling and we were told to stand by. We turned, facing the incoming current and gave just enough fuel to maintain a geostationary position, going three knots through the water, but near zero over the bottom. 19.9 gallons since Hyannis. We were on our mooring by noon. The mooring balls are interesting. They are smaller and Tripp tells you to pick up the whole ball, and put it on deck and reach down to pull up the heavier pennant below.
The primary purpose of out visit here, other than that it is a beautiful spot, was so Lene could rendezvous with Janie and Donna, childhood friends who Lene had not seen since high school in Brooklyn several decades ago. They drove us for a propane refill and groceries and to Donna's very nicely  refurbished, comfortable 1820's home where we picked up kitty litter that Lene had shipped there. After unloading and stowing we went back to shore, were joined by Donna's wife, Vicki, had dinner at the local restaurant, overlooking the river, Back Eddy, and some wine aboard with the friends.

The marina's launch charges only $1 per person per ride so the dink had a rest day on its davit bar. A very pleasant day for Lene, and I got to meet some new friends.

Days 30 and 31 -- August 21-22 -- Cuttyhunk -- 14.5 nm

I planned to leave Tashmoo at eleven a.m. I had read that this would be one hour before high tide. But I saw that it was already high at 10:30 so we left then, and had no less than ten feet under us on the way out. (So we did not come in at high tide two days earlier!) Once out, we raised full sails and tried wing on wing for a while, heading about 280 magnetic. Then a broad reach, followed by dead air (during which we motored for five minutes) before the wind came back. But now it was on our port bow and then port beam. So wind came from all over the place and at all speeds from zero to 19 wind units.
Passing through Quick's Hole back into Buzzards Bay was easy. It is wide and we gybed in it. It was warm and sunny and a pleasure to sail. We saw about fifteen boats anchored in single file at the western side of this hole, including three sailboats.  I want to investigate whether this can be done safely overnight, and in what wind conditions. We took a mooring in the inner harbor of Cuddyhunk at 2:30 after four hours underway. Our speed under sail varied between zero and 7.4 knots. And our average speed was about 3.6 knots.
I marvel at old time sailors' ability to navigate to a destination by dead reckoning. One goes off course in gusts and speed is never constant and has to be measured through the water with set and drift (which are also constantly changing) needing to be factored in. Our chart plotter tells me where I am, what direction I'm actually moving (not heading) and how fast I'm actually going across the surface of the earth. It makes sailing very easy -- until the electronic toy breaks or looses juice. Still, near shore (at least by day and without fog), one can take bearings on notable landmarks and have a pretty good idea where one is. And far off shore, until one approaches shore, it is less important to know exactly where you are.
We lowered the dink but dined aboard both nights here. A sloop, "R and R", took the mooring next to us. Parents with a son and daughter. The kids were good at following instructions of the father to perform needed tasks. Then I saw father and son in their dink, struggling to get their outboard to start. After a few minutes I offered them ours so the kids were able to get their ice cream after all. I get help from so many folks that it's a pleasure to be able to give back.
The moorings here were apparently reset since the last time we were in the inner harbor. (In 2013 we anchored in the less protected outer harbor.) They seem much closer than before, too darn close for comfort, privacy or safety.
It rained our first night but the days have been lovely, clear, bright, warm but not hot and evenings of late have called for a light quilt, reminding us that fall is on its way.
We dinked ashore in search of fresh fish, remembering a time when we approached the dock from land and saw a thick rope hanging down from a scaffold --- which turned out to be half a swordfish. That time we paid for a healthy slice and cooked it immediately once aboard. But alas, those days are over. There is a new man who brings fish to Cuttyhunk (though not today) but he gets his fish from the markets in New Bedford, not from the sea.  We got a Cuttyhunk postcard, walked to the top for the views (Newport bridge towers, New Bedford, and the Vineyard) got two gallons of water and 1.5 of diesel in our auxiliary yellow tank. There was a restaurant and a B and B called the Fishing Club at which I had breakfast once with Jim, K.C. and Art maybe ten years ago. The B and B is still here but the restaurant is gone. Young men still cruise around in the mooring field offering plates of raw bar, and cooked lobsters can be purchased at a stand near the dinghy dock. However, the former restaurant is now a gift shop, though the tiny food market is still here. You think nothing changes in a small island like this, winter population 15, but changes do take place.

Days 28-29. -- August 19-20. -- Lake Tashmoo in Martha's Vineyard -- 20.5 nm

We were underway from 8:05 to 12:35, four and a half hours, and most of the time we intentionally sailed slowly, by furling the small jib, going off course and trimming the main for non optimum speed. Why would I ever intentionally go slow, folks who know me may ask? Because (1) having motored out through the channel too fast, at six knots without straining the engine, and, (2) at the Mate's request, not hoisting the main until breakfast was cooked and eaten, we found that we were sailing across Buzzards Bay at more than six knots toward Woods Hole and would arrive there while it was too near full flood unless we slowed down. So it was a gentle sail at about three knots on a port reach and we mostly sailed through the Hole about half an hour before slack, with only a knot or two of current pushing us, a slow pace that let us see the buoys rather than rush past them, possibly onto the rocks. Slower is safer, especially because there is s lot of traffic going both ways in the Hole including big power boats with their huge wakes and ferrys. Also, the current does not flow straight through the channel, but partly to the side, pushing you out of the channel if you are not attentive. In 2008 we came through with friends, Peter and Debbie, much faster, and our keel bounced off a rock on the way! This time it was easy, though we did have to motor during the central past of the compound curve when the wind was on our nose.
Once through the Hole and back into Vineyard Sound, it was only about three miles further to the entrance to Lake Tashmoo, which is the only port in the Vineyard we had never been in. The only trick during this leg was crossing Middle Ground shoal at its 15 foot spot rather than at its eight foot spots. This was easy with the GPS chart plotter. In fact we saw no less than 20 feet of water while crossing the shoal. Coming into Tashmoo at near high tide through the privately maintained reds and greens our seven foot depth alarm beeped only at two spots, briefly. We took a mooring for two nights. The lake is very shallow over much of its surface (like one foot deep). It looks like they dredged the channel through an inside sandbar and we saw folks standing in the water, up to their ankles, on both sides. But our mooring area was in ten feet of water.
After lunch and R and R we dinked to the extremely overcrowded public dinghy dock and walked less than a mile to Vineyard Haven for groceries and posted the last post. We saw "Florence Foster Jenkins" the latest Meryl Streep movie, and had dinner at Copper Wok. It's been a long time since we've had Chinese food and they serve big portions but not great food. At the next table were two couples who live in the Berkshires, where we are going for the Labor Day weekend, but keep their boat, when not cruising, in Rockport Maine. We noticed that Rockport is "full"of wooden boats and the blog (summer 2013) has photos of some of them. And what a boats hey have: a Concordia Yawl of 1956, that they had paid what must be an enormous sum last winter to have everything below the water line replaced. I had seen a half sized model of a Concordia yawl in the Whaling Musuem and the gentleman said "Yes, that's my boat! But why pay for a half sized model." Seeing the model made the defining feature of a yawl, as compared to a ketch, easy for Ilene to see.
Walking back in the dark after dinner we saw and heard part of the big annual fireworks show that was staged in Oak Park. Both of our nights here were very quiet night; we could have saved the $40 mooring fee and anchored. In the morning I did a lot of the remaining navigating, "fixed" the outboard's stalling problem by adjusting a set screw about 3/16" back, so that idle cannot get low enough to stall.  But I seem to have created another problem: the gear shifter -- forward, neutral and reverse -- does not move except at the new idle speed. This fall wiser heads will examine the problem. I went to town our second day here because Lene likes some alone time and cell and wifi service is very terrible in Tashmoo. I also checked out the bookstore which has a good nautical collection and bought vegetables. This was a great place that I had overlooked during prior cruises to The Vineyard, as long as you enter and exit at near high tide. Next stop: Cuttyhunk.

Days 24-27. -- August 15-18 -- New Bedford. -- 12.7 nm

Lots of photo will be added in September.
Learning from yesterday, we left Mattapoiset early, at 8:45 and sailed under main and small jib (though Genoa was doable) with wind from the north. Just a pleasant easy gentle starboard reaching sail on a sunny day. But when we reached the long channel (about five miles long) leading into New Bedford the wind got light, the tide was wrong and the course would have required tacking up the channel. And it is frequented by large commercial fishing vessels. So we motored. We passed the huge sea wall with its movable gates open. It is designed to stop storm surges from wrecking this harbor in hurricanes, leaving open a closable channel 150 feet wide. We took a mooring at Pope's Island Marina at 11:30. That island forms a second barrier to the sea, in terms of waves, filing most of the space, shore to shore. The marina is on the seaward side of the island and our mooring is very close to red "10", which flashes all night.

The rest of out first day here, after checking in, was devoted to food shopping, cleaning and laundry. The staff here are very friendly and helpful. They even gave us one free pass to the Whaling Museum, not advertised as an amenity, and offered to drive us to the Shop and Stop. The mooring price is only $35, with free wifi at the picnic area. But they have an interesting wrinkle: $5 per person for showers! We showered aboard. They have more slips than moorings and in one of the slips is a Solent rigged Contest, of about 45 feet, which looks much like our Saga, called "Watercolors". I took a good look at her from the finger dock in her owner's absence. Another Solent rigged boat took a mooring near us on our last day here. The Marina has a launch, to any part of the harbor,  but it is $3 per person each way, so our dink got good use, except the last afternoon when the outboard temporarily acted up again. The municipal dinghy dock is right in the heart of town, three tenth of a mile across the Acushnet River from us, free and very underutilized. When we visited the Glass Museum (you can skip it) we dinked over a mile upstream to a small dock just shy of the low I-95 bridge and walked back a bit.

The city, at least the downtown part, with its cobblestone streets that we crisscrossed, is small, perhaps eight blocks square and has many old stone buildings formerly and currently used to support the fishing industry as well as many elegant former banks, now housing other businesses and the full array of municipal governmental buildings. This was a very wealthy town in its nineteenth century day. I'm sure it has a suburban and mall based part too, but we did not get that far on foot. I sensed that it got down on its luck but is trying to rebuild with tourism, in addition to its still active fishing industry, bringing in more dollars worth of seafood than any other port in America.

We visited the New Bedford Whaling Museum, the largest of the museums in town. I give a lot of credit to the the whaling museum in Cold Spring Harbor, reviewed in this blog right after the Fourth of July, for covering much of the same ground, with a much smaller budget. New Bedford calls itself "The Whaling Capital of the World" and "The City that Lit America" with whale oil. An early chapter from Moby Dick was set in the Seamans Bethel, an interdenominational religious center built by the Quakers to serve the spiritual needs of the Whalers. It is across the street from the museum and temporarily closed for renovations. Though the Pequod's ill-fated voyage began from Nantucket, Moby Dick's Ishmael visited the Bethel.The whaling industry was a multi million dollar industry but today, with conservation, the whale watching industry is a multi billion dollar industry, albeit with inflated dollars.The museum has a large permanent display devoted to the human contribution to New Bedford's whaling industry mostly from the Azores and Cape Verde Islands, but slso including Eskimos, blacks, native Americans and South Seas Islanders, a very diverse group. In fact the whalers picked up crew wherever they could find them. That diversity is one of the reasons that the
Underground Railroad was so big here, with more runaway slaves here than in any other US city. In other places the black runaways would stand out in the crowd like a sore thumb as a prize for bounty hunters. Here they blended into a diverse crowd. The Museum has a half scale model of the Lagoda, an actual whaling ship, masts and all, indoors, that visitors can board -- if they duck to avoid banging their heads. They also had a vast and somewhat disorganized section on the history of the area and its peoples and a large art gallery featuring  nautical paintings including icescapes by William Bradford, who was a friend of Albert Bierstadt, one of my favorite artists for his western landscapes.
We also visited several gallerys, the U. Mass. campus here, which is its Art School, and the New Bedford Art Museum. The latter had an temporary exhibit of Bierstadt, what luck! But the museum was small, not very good and so a disappointment. But interestingly, the signage was in English, Portugese and Spanish, in that order, with about one third of the 95,000 folks who live here being of Pertugese descent.
We bought some clothing, very inexpensive, and did the Underground Railroad tour led by a ranger of  the National Parks Service. In additions to the Pilgrims and later the Puritans, another religious sect settled in this area: the Quakers, and in addition to their being pacifists, they were leaders in the antislavery movement.
We had lunch in both of the most popular waterfront fish places, The Black Whale and Waterfront Grill. Both are on the waterfront, but at the land end between piers at which the large commercial fishing boats were docked -- so one gets a narrow view of the harbor.
One afternoon, I gave Lene some alone time when visiting the Rotch -Jones - Duff house. Built by the first owner, a Quaker merchant (whaling ship owner) which displayed an elegant lifestyle in its day. The whaling men risked their lives for wages while the owners risked their assets but not their
asses, for profit. Mr. Rotch broke the Nantucket cartel of the whaling industry by moving his operations to New Bedford, which also had the advantage of being a deeper harbor. Another famous local was Rodman, who developed the use of spermaceti into very clean burning candles. The local
fort is named after him, and I wonder if Rodman's Neck, across from the Harlem YC is named after a
relative. I'll check that out some day.

The reason for our fourth day here is that thousands or runners are convening for  a road race in Falmouth and Woods Hole, making moorings there unavailable.  Plans keep changing.

Day 23 -- August 14 -- Mattapoiset -- 8.2 nm

We lallygagged around in Marion until 11:45 with delicious omelettes and sheer laziness in the heat. This was a mistake because in the afternoon the wind came up strongly from the SW, where we had to go, and the tide was against us too. I flew full main and small jib and it was too much with about 25 apparent wind units. We had to go south all the way to Cleveland Ledge before tacking. Too much heeling said the mate, even when I lowered the traveler.  OK, so we will furl the headsail and use only main. But with that configuration we were making only three knots over ground and were being set onto the point that we had to get around. OK, so we motored sailed a few of the miles, till we could turn into the big Bay in which Mattapoiset sits.
Our prior visits were on moorings rented by Mattapoiset Boatyard, on the NE side of the Bay, which are strong moorings. They have a good shower and we took a nice walk in to town.  We always ate at the only real restaurant in town, the Kinsale Inn, which states that it is America's oldest seaside Inn, built in 1790. It had a menu with a mild Irish flavor. Well, Kinsale is an Irish fishing town after all.

This time with the prevailing strong SW winds we anchored off the NE shore, somewhat protected by the land from the wind and greatly protected from the waves. For the record, we were at N. 41, 38.9, W. 70, 48.8, in waters that ranged from 10 to 15 feet, depending on the tides, with 60 feet of snubbed chain (except the snubber line fell off and dangled uselessly in the rather calm night). The mooring field was a bit closer to shore, in water that got gradually shallower, so we were not close to shore and with so much room around us and with the nearby boats vacant we acted like the French with outdoor showering, in complete privacy.
With the heat, we turned to tweaking our remaining itinerary until Westport Mass, where we will be meeting HS friends of Lene. (tweaking our itenarary beat boat polishing in the heat that we were experiencing in harbor.) I figured that in the days available, if the tides worked out, we could go to Woods Hole and thence to Nantucket for a few days. That would have pleased me because our friend Rhoda gave me a copy of Nathaniel Philbrick's "Away Off Shore: Nantucket Island and its People 1602 - 1890" about the whalers from there. They had made an appearance in Robert Hughes's "The Fatal Shore" which I have been reading all summer, about the settlement of Australia, largely as a penal colony.
But Lene was not keen on going east again so Nantucket will have to wait. Lene's
 only prior trip there, on a prior boat, was memorable for the heat, from which we escaped in an air conditioned movie:"Something About Mary" which we enjoyed with Evie and her late husband Selwyn.
Our current proposed itinerary from Mattapoiset is: New Bedford, Hadley's Harbor by Woods Hole in the Elizabeth Islands, Tashmoo Pond (tiny and overlooked until now, a twenty minute walk to Vineyard Haven, Cuddyhunk (at the other end of the Elizabeth's) and then Westport. But like all of our sailing plans, this too is subject to change.
We learned that the Kinsale Inn went out of business three years ago, but there is still a restaurant whose website map suggested to me that it was near the demised Kinsale.  It is simply called The Inn at Mattapoiset and is in the same 1790 building, under new management, without the Irish touch. The food was just as good; not great, and I used their wifi to post the last posting and watched our only bit of the Olympics this year. The dinghy ride in to town, six tenth of a mile, was fun and we secured the dink off the wall of the stone pier to a line strung parallel to the side of the pier, about 20 feet away, so it could not bash against the wall. On the return ride we saw big storm clouds, saw bits of lightning above and below, but the storm was far enough away that we heard no thunder, felt no rain and experienced no increased winds. Coming back to ILENE, she was the only boat in the area with an anchor light, making the approach to her stern very easy.

Day 22 -- August 13 -- Marion -- 7.2 nm

We sailed forth between Wings Neck to the north and Scraggy Neck  to the south (a wide entrance but where do they get these names). We left the Cape and crossed Buzzards Bay to the mainland at Marion. Wind was light and from the NE so we had a broad starboard reach going westward and then a close reach heading northerly into the harbor. We left at 11:45 and got onto a mooring of the Beverly YC at 1:15.  So dividing the miles by the time, one can see that this was a slow passage. And part of the reason for this is that we used only the Genoa with no main. What's the rush? It was sunny and warm but out on the water it was not hot, like it is on land. Most traffic in Buzzards Bay runs to or from the canal, and is either a beat or a run. Crossing the Bay was a pleasure. Alfie Girl no longer cedes sole possession of the cubby in the base of the helmspersons seat to Witty. They both crowd into aAthis tiny space. They enjoyed the ride too, photo to follow, as in almost all of the posts on this cruise.

Marion is a charming little town and I do mean little. It's general store was fun though and it supports a coffee shop and a book store. And it is mostly a residential community, all around the bay; but on foot on a hot day, we did not explore far.
The Beverly YC, whose moorings nearly fill the inner harbor, is the biggest thing around, with a nice but not ostentatious clubhouse, a large membership, low dues and a major claim to fame: the biannual  600+ mile Marion to Bermuda Race starts here. Nice showers, but only two of them, so I wonder how hundreds or racers get clean before the race. My late son in law, Julien, won that race about eight years ago. He did it in a Beneteau 36 and after he won the many older and richer men who spend a fortune trying to do so amended the rules. They now forbid smaller boats like his from entering. Some beautiful boats here, pics to follow.
We dined in ILENE's cockpit, as we have been doing much more this trip than in the past. Lene is very particular about what she eats, and it is often easier for her to cook it herself. One side effect, in addition to a rather low cost cruise, is that because I eat what she cooks, with occasional ice cream or baked dainties ashore, I'll probably weigh less when we get back. I contributed a pan of rutabaga, potato and onion home fries in Marion. Not bad!
In the evening the humidity seemed to reach 100%. The air was wet and the skies grey. We prepared for the possibility of rain and about midnight a front passed. after a decent interval of very strong wind torrential rain fell for about an hour, though we were asleep and not watching the clock. Cool night though, once we were able to open hatches.